Although pump-type dispensers are becoming increasingly available, the most commonly used container for holding flowable products (such as toothpastes, lotions, salves, caulks, adhesives and sealants) remains the tube. Such tubes are typically made of plastic or other suitable material, capped on one end from which the flowable product is dispensed, and laterally pinched and sealed on the other end following the filling of the tube with the product.
Although tube-type containers for flowable products have been used for a number of years, the use of such containers continues to this day to be plagued by one problem--the inability of the consumer to extract substantially all of the contained product from the tube. In these times of heightened concern with the cost of purchased consumer goods, nothing frustrates a consumer more than to waste purchased flowable product by leaving it in the tube. Tube-type dispensers suffer from an additional drawback in that they are difficult for some persons, especially the elderly or disabled, to use. While a number of devices have been invented claiming to efficiently and easily remove flowable products from tube-type containers, these devices have typically been mechanically complicated, unreliable and/or expensive to produce. Accordingly, there is a need for a low cost, efficient and easy to use device for dispensing flowable products from tube-type containers.